Editor’s note: This article was initially published in The Daily Gazette, Swarthmore’s online, daily newspaper founded in Fall 1996. As of Fall 2018, the DG has merged with The Phoenix. See the about page to read more about the DG.
Bike Share Program
Jeff Cao ’10, of Chester Neighborhood Bike Works, is now contracted to fix the bike share program’s bikes. According to Jeff, the bikes are working and should be available for use once the bike locks and keys are tagged.
Several StuCo members inquired as to whether the bike rack containing the bike share bikes could be moved next to McCabe, where students will checkout keys for the bike locks. However, StuCo decided that the rack behind Parrish would be used, because it is more protected from the weather.
At the end of the semester, when Cao’s contract with StuCo ends, StuCo plans to evaluate the bike share program, along with Bike Work’s contract, and possibly make changes.
Halloween Party Cleanup
At Sunday’s meeting, Luis Peñate ‘13, Student Events Advisor, expressed concern over the Halloween party cleanup. Peñate said that SAC hired one employee to clean Sharples following the party and, because of this, Peñate and other students, including Sonja Spoo ‘13, Appointments Chair, felt obligated to stay after the party to clean.
StuCo plans to meet with the SAC co-directors and with Dean Braun to discuss what happened so that cleanup may be better coordinated in the future.
Meal Points in the Ville
Several StuCo members are meeting with Sue Welsh, Vice President for Finance and Treasurer, to discuss using meal points in the ville. In the past, StuCo has been told that this project would be too expensive; however, StuCo members are looking for ways to ameliorate the cost.
Last year, StuCo considered using rollover money to buy ID card-swiping machines for businesses in the ville, but this fell through.
Simon Zhu ’11, President of Student Council, suggested asking business that have expressed an interest in joining with the college, such as Hobbes and the Coop, if they would be willing to share the expenses of the program. Still, StuCo is waiting to collect more specific cost information before taking further action.
Rollover Money
StuCo is working with SBC to try to decrease the amount of rollover money that is left at the end of each semester. Zhu, along with several other StuCo members, plans to meet with Naomi Liang ‘11, SBC Office Manager, this week to discuss possible avenues of action.
Zhu suggested replacing or refocusing the Fun Fund, among other changes. He also suggested using rollover money to provide seed funding to student groups.
Miscellaneous
- StuCo plans to propose to SBC in the near future to get funding for plastic sleeves so that they can hang updates in bathroom stalls around campus.
- StuCo has been in touch with Stu Hain, Vice President of Facilities and Services, in regard to TV repair. StuCo hopes that Facilities will provide a timeline of when repairs are scheduled to occur.
- The student resource guide should be created soon and will give students information about planning events. In the future, the guide will include information about organizing clubs and sports.
- StuCo plans to hold a campus-wide discussion regarding faculty and staff diversity after meeting with Dean Braun and other administrators. A similar meeting for students was held last Friday.
Why is StuCo spending so much time on improving access to food off-campus, when there is so much to improve about food on-campus??
Seriously, you guys should focus on improving the mediocre bag lunches! Why does it make sense to do the SAME bag lunch on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the same students pick that food up? I'm sick of the mediocre, same, boring bag lunches that i've had to deal with for the past semesters!
also, while you're at it, the rollover money should go to Sharples in making local food night happen once a month or twice a month or something. If it happens, everyone benefits, eats healthy, and is actually excited for Sharples.
I concur. But Jamie is still much appreciated for waking up at 5:30 AM to make all those sandwiches!
Honestly, though, it's not just that the bag lunches are distressingly bland and/or un-filling, it's just a very curious oversight for Sharples to decide that Tuesday and Thursday bag lunches are exactly the same. LITERALLY any other combination of days makes more sense since, you know, Tuesday and Thursday classes are the same and presumably, if you have to get bag lunch on Tuesday, you also have to get it on Thursday. Can we get PB&J on Thursday? Please?
It's such an easy thing to fix that it makes the current setup so bizarre. It's almost like Sharples hired Foxconn to make all its PR decisions.
1. no way more pb&j. that's total torture for vegetarians & vegans, who already have to suffer through everyone's ridiculous idea that that is acceptable meat-free faire!
2. i'm sure SAC, and the cleanup efforts, worked very hard to clean-up after the party. however, the middle room (where some of us fondly sat, day in and day out) has been utterly reorganized — the awful giant gray tables were actually SPLIT UP to make to awful giant gray tables (usurping my creme-de-la-creme local at what used to be a long wood table next to the window) and there is now a funny short wood table, and way too many tables in rows.
i guess we students will find a way to remedy this effort, but jeez! — pay attention to where things go!
that, yes! — more local food at sharples! and what if we could use our swipe $$ to buy things at the ville? like hummus? like (the otherwise terribly expensive) seminar breaks?!?
I don't understand what the complaint is about the halloween party cleanup. SAC organized the party, to my understanding they've always had to clean it, and one of the stipulations of the party being in Sharples is that it has to get cleaned by the next meal. Suck it up or relocate the party to somewhere more convenient.
Hello Crabby,
Thank you for your concerns. When we were putting together the tables I knew something looked off. However, it was around 5 am when we were doing the set up of tables and we were all pretty tired since the three SAC members who stayed behind to clean from 2am-5am (stayed even longer) had been working the party since around 8pm the previous day.
I also enjoy that area of Sharples and I'm sure that if it really is a problem, students will try to reorganize it. The tables aren't really that heavy.
Have a good day and thank you for voicing your concerns.
Luis Peñate '13
Student Events Advisor
please don’t take crabby’s views as representative! speaking as a vegetarian who’s talked to lots of non-vegetarians about this: pb&j is the best, it’s simple and reliable and so, so, so much better than peanut noodle salad.
please don’t take crabby’s views as representative! speaking as a vegetarian who’s talked to lots of non-vegetarians about this: pb&j is the best, it’s simple and reliable and so, so, so much better than peanut noodle salad.
I think that before they try and get our points to work in the ville, someone should deal with all the extra meals a lot of us have at the end of the week. If I can't sign up for less than 14 meals, but use maybe 10… can't my meals roll over, or turn into points, or SOMETHING? If it's not possible to elect out of the meal plan (it's not) or choose less than 14 a week (also not) it seems ridiculous that students like me are forced to waste money on food we're not consuming.